President Trump on Thursday signed an executive order establishing a bipartisan commission to investigate potential voter fraud and voter suppression in the US election system.

Vice President Pence and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach will lead the panel called the “Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity” dedicated to looking into Trump’s as-yet-unfounded allegations of fraudulent voting.

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White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Thursday that the commission plans to have its work completed by 2018.

“The commission will review policies and practices that enhance or undermine the American people’s confidence in the integrity of federal elections and provide the president with a report that identifies system vulnerabilities that lead to improper registrations and voting,” Sanders said.

“The president is committed to the thorough review of registration and voting issues in federal elections and that’s exactly what this commission is tasked with doing.”

Trump has repeatedly insisted, without evidence, that 3 million to 5 million illegal votes were cast for his Democratic challenger Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential election.
Though Trump won the critical Electoral College vote, Clinton handily won the popular vote — to the president’s consternation.

The move comes six months after the election — but with a White House in crisis, as Washington and the nation continue to reel from Trump’s firing of FBI Director James Comey earlier this week.

Days after Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration, he tweeted that will be “asking for a major investigation into VOTER FRAUD.”

In November, Trump tweeted, “In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”

The new panel will include about a dozen Republicans and Democrats, including current and former secretaries of state, the White House said.

Sanders announced five members to the commission – Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson, New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner, Maine Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap, former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, Christie McCormick, commissioner of the election assistance commission.

In a reaction to the news, Sen. Bernie Sanders tweeted, “Trump just announced a commission to examine voter fraud. The only problem with that is there is virtually no voter fraud in this country.”